(From the US Sailing website:www.ussailing.org)

US SAILING’s 2010 Rolex Miami OCR
Olympic Medal Races Determine Prized Podium Positions

Miami, Fla. (January 30, 2010) – It was “one race, one chance” today at US SAILING’s 2010 Rolex Miami OCR, the second of seven stops of the International Sailing Federation (ISAF) Sailing World Cup 2009-2010. After gold, silver and bronze medalists were determined yesterday in three Paralympic classes, it was now the turn for sailors in ten Olympic classes to claim podium positions, but the plot came with a twist. Just as will happen at the Olympics in 2012, only the top-ten finishers--determined after five days of fleet racing--earned the right to sail in today’s single medal race for each class, except for in Women’s Match Racing. In that event, which makes its Olympic debut in 2012, sailors competed in finals and petit-finals to determine medalists.

The Rolex Miami OCR, which this year hosted 448 teams (633 athletes) from 45 nations, is one of the world’s most competitive regattas for 2012 Olympic and Paralympic hopefuls. As such, each nation’s medal tally is closely watched; USA had the most medals with 10, followed by Great Britain with six, France with five and Spain with four.

In the Women’s Match Racing finals, Anna Tunnicliffe (Plantation, Fla.), Molly Vandemoer (Redwood City, Calif.) and Debbie Capozzi (Bayport, N.Y.) defeated Lucy MacGregor’s GBR team in a highly charged, best-of-five series. Team MacGregor hadn’t lost a race since the first round until today’s race three against Tunnicliffe. Tunnicliffe went on to win the fourth race s well, tying up the score 2-2, so the tie-breaker became a do-or-die match for the gold. After a tough start, Tunnicliffe trailed MacGregor on the first beat, but MacGregor hit some waves and slowed down and Tunnicliffe caught up by the bottom mark. On the downwind leg, MacGregor jibed early, and Tunnicliffe extended on port and jibed, catching the waves. From that point on, Tunnicliffe defended the starboard layline and narrowly edged out MacGregor by half a boat length.

“We had a great day on the water,” said Tunnicliffe. “My team did a great job of staying in the game despite the two losses in the beginning. We fought back and kept it calm and pulled off the moves we needed to and are so happy we came out on top.”

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US SAILING’s 2010 Rolex Miami OCR
Top-three Finishes

Elliott 6m - Women’s Match Racing (24 teams)

1. Anna Tunnicliffe/Molly Vandemoer/Debbie Capozzi (Plantation, Fla., USA/Palo Alto, Calif., USA/(Bayport, N.Y., USA)
2. Lucy Macgregor/Annie Lush/Ally Martin (GBR)
3. Claire Leroy/Marie Riou/Elodie Bertrand (FRA)

For complete results, please visit:
http://www.wimra.org/documents/RMOCR10-WMR-FinalResults.pdf